


Nihil Novi

by Quietbang



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: 1950s, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe- Hospital, Angst, Astral Plane, Homophobia, Inspired by Art, Inspired by Poetry, M/M, Nightmares, Politics, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Recovery, Telepathy, Traumatic Injury, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-17
Updated: 2012-07-17
Packaged: 2017-11-10 04:45:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/462332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quietbang/pseuds/Quietbang
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 1954.<br/>The first mass vaccination of children for polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.<br/>American officials announce that a hydrogen bomb test has been conducted on the island of Bikini Atoll.<br/>In Vietnam, the First Indochina War draws to a close, leaving chaos in its wake that will result in yet another war, while in America, Senator Jospeh McCarthy begins hearings investigating the US Army for being 'soft' on Communism.<br/>In New York City, surgical resident and Korean War veteran Charles Xavier is feeling increasingly disconnected from the world around him, save for the children that he helps treat.  All of this changes with the arrival of a nameless man pulled out of the Hudson, whom Charles finds himself  increasingly drawn to.<br/>There's just one problem. He's in a coma, and knows Charles only as the mysterious and irritating force who helps to calm his dreams. </p><p>A powered, pre-canon, hospital AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you ever so much to my wonderful artist Sarlyne, who is gifted and talented in ways I can only hope to be. Her guidance and support have been invaluable. Thanks also to ascoolsuchasi for first-run beta-ing and general magnificence and to spicedpiano for her excellent beta work and invaluable eye for catching tense shifts.  
> The art masterpost can be found [ here ](http://sarlyne.tumblr.com/post/27429488936/xmenreversebang-nihil-novi-written-by-quietbang).

_I have followed my sorrowful way  
for two thousand years  
and my track  
day by day  
have dragged behind me like a shadow –  
a litany of infamy and evil  
_  
excerpted from        _Nihil Novi_       by     Wladyslaw Szlengel

_He is unconscious when they drag him out of the water._

_The emergency response team cuts away his muddy clothes._

_He has lost his suit jacket in the depths of the Hudson, and his shirt collar slings stickily to the trail of blood on the back of his neck._

_He has no identification. A wallet with twenty-two dollars in it- no charge cards. No wedding ring. No identifying marks save those etched savagely in his skin by history- and those are not unheard of in this part of the city._

_It is 1954, and the man they pull from the water does not officially exist._

__

“Charles!” Someone was shaking his shoulder. His heart began to race, adrenaline pumping through his limbs, and he was halfway into his trousers before he glanced at the hand on his arm.

 _Hank_.

He breathed a sigh of relief.

It was early, and the light streaming in through the dormitory windows was dim and tinged  
with blue.

He groaned, and  flopped back onto the narrow cot.

“What is it, Hank?” he said, attempting to infuse his voice with his normal patience and calm.

“It- you-” Hank stuttered. “You were making noises.”

“I was?” Charles squinted. He didn’t remember what he had been dreaming about. “What time is it?”

“5:40. We’re on at 7:00.”

Charles winced as he stretched out his shoulders. “Right. Give me a minute, yeah? Then we can get something to eat. Might as well, anyway.”

Half an hour later, they are ensconced on hard metal chairs, bowls of watery oatmeal in front of them. Charles tentatively  poked it with a spoon, causing the grey mass to first cling to the metal and then slide off in an unattractive sloop, leaving an oily residue behind.

He raised an eyebrow. “This is worse than the Army, I think.”

Hank winced in sympathy. “I have some nuts upstairs. Raven brought them.”

“And she didn’t bring anything for her own brother?”

Hank shrugged. “She said that you could take care of yourself.”

Charles smirked. “Sounds to me like someone’s being courted. ”

“Well, I- I mean- I don’t _mind_ , and-”

Charles laughed, and clapped him on the shoulder. “Relax, McCoy. It was a joke. I assume I don’t have to warn you about what will happen if you hurt her?”

Hank shook his head mutely.

“Good.” He did not move his hand. “Then know this- if you have sexual relations with my sister, you will either do so within the confines of marriage, or you will use methods that I cannot legally condone but that I’m told are available at quite a reasonable price from Sean’s backroom. If you get her pregnant, I will kill you. Then I will reanimate you, and your reanimated corpse will find  
itself bound to my sister in the sacrament of marriage. Am I making myself clear?”

His fingers dug into Hank’s shoulder joint.

Hank squeaked slightly, and nodded.

“Glad to hear it.” He glared at his oatmeal in disgust before pushing himself up from the table,  
pocketing the slightly soft apple that came with the the oatmeal.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m late for a date with Armando. He promised me coffee. Real stuff.”

Hank made a choked noise of longing. “Bring me some?”

Charles grinned. “Go bribe your own orderly. Better yet, get my sister to bring you something, if she’s so keen to help.”

“We’re on the clock in half an hour, you know.”

“I know.” Charles smiled, tipping an imaginary cap in Hank’s general direction.

Hank’s eyes tracked his back as he left. When the door clicked closed behind him, Hank deflated slightly, returning his spoon to his bowl of oatmeal with an unsatisfying _slurp_.

_  
His bones were screaming.  
The pain tore at him, choked him, the fog swirling in his head making it impossible to move. He had to get up, he had to get up, he was going to die here, he couldn't die here- not when he had someone to live for._

_But here it was peaceful. Nothing hurt, and the world was so very full of pain and misery and other people's horrors. Outside is grey and mud and death, the scent of ash that was a memory and prayer and a nightmare, the choke of rotting food and oozing sores.  
He is tired, bone tired, and he can't sleep out there, and so he let's the last vestiges of awareness waft away and so drifted deeper into the darkness.._

As a rule, Charles was scrupulously punctual.

He was also polite, and painstakingly precise in his appearance.

It helped with the stares, he finds, with the people who see only his limp and his cane and assume  
that he is a patient, rather than a doctor.

He smiled at families anxiously waiting in cramped, smokey rooms; kissed the hands of worried grandmothers, is smoothly appreciative of wearily beautiful women in factory dress, fingers rough with callouses and frantically clicking rosaries.

It’s self-preservation, really. He could hear them, no matter how hard he shielded- there is no power in the verse stronger than a mother whose child is in pain- and to comfort them, to charm them,was to allow himself a little respite from the doubts and fears of strangers.

Their thoughts pressed at him as he made his way to the operating theatre, pecking at his carefully maintained shields, and so when he reached the swinging double doors he is forced to pause.  
He breathed deeply, the vaguely comforting astringent smell of the hospital soothing his  
already frayed nerves; then, glancing at portrait of St Luke, he muttered a brief prayer and pushed through the doors.

\----  
His day began with a motor vehicle accident. The patient was thirteen and, despite the cocktail of medication currently being infused into her bloodstream, still conscious, her pain and fear projected so deafeningly it was a wonder everyone cannot hear.

“What’s her name?” Charles asked, glancing at the nurses prepping her for surgery.

The  older one shot him a look. “Katherine, Doctor Xavier.”

The younger one smiled. “Her parents called her Kitty.”

She glanced at Charles out of the corner of her eye, and he sighed inwardly. Nurse  
Grey had been particularly unsubtle about her slight crush, which was a shame; Charles had always found her company restful, her thoughts less thunderous than most.

 _And where’s the harm in that?_ A treacherous voice in the back of his head  
whispered. _She needn’t know that you’re not the marrying kind._

He smiled back, then turned to the patient. “Kitty, I’m Doctor Xavier. I’m going to  
help Doctor Howlett fix you up, all right? Do you understand what’s happening?”  
She blinked, her brown eyes wide and terrified. Her panic grew stronger as she  
attempted to move-Charles quickly reached into her mind, distracting her from the  
bloody mass that was her lower body. She didn’t need to see that. He concentrated on calming her instead, easing the tangled tendrils of terror from her mind.

**Hush now. It’s alright. Rest.**

Her eyes began to close.

He reached out and touched her hand comfortingly. “The nurses are going to put you to sleep now, okay? I’ll be here when you wake up, I promise.”

Her eyes fluttered, but she calmed, and allowed the nurses to finish prepping her.

Charles turned to find Doctor Howlett staring at him. He  raised an eyebrow. “Yes, sir?”

The doctor shook himself, dispelling whatever thoughts had held him captive. “What? Oh. Nothing. You’re good with kids, Xavier. Got one of your own, do you?”

Charles shook his head. “No, sir. Just a sister, sir.”

“Hmph.”

“I beg your pardon, sir?”

“Nothing, Xavier. Go scrub up.”

“Yes, sir.”

The surgery goes well- they are able to save her legs, and after thirteen hours of  suturing and packing wounds and suctioning away blood, Dr Howlett jerked his chin at Charles and said, “Close her up, Xavier. Meet me in the surgeon’s lounge when you’re done.”

He left, pulling off his gloves and tossing them in a bin by the door.

Charles sutured carefully, precisely measuring the tension of the thread, his state of concentration such that time blurred. He finished quickly, shed his gloves and gown, and scrubbed fiercely with carbolic soap.  

The hallways were dark and empty by the time he reached the surgeon’s lounge, the waiting rooms mostly clear. Visiting hours had long since passed, and worried families have vacated their stiff vinyl benches for a cigarette and a cup of coffee.

He pushed open the door, and was quickly enveloped in a thick cloud of cigar smoke.

He coughed slightly, and Dr Howlett looked up from the paper spread over his lap.

“Xavier. Good. You’re here. Any problems?”

“No, sir. It was quite routine.”

Doctor Howlett regarded him, his thick brows drawn together in consternation.

“You’re a strange one, you know that?”

“Sir?”

The doctor clasped his hands together, inhaling deeply from the cigar clenched beneath his yellowed teeth. “It takes a special sort of person to go into meatball surgery, Xavier. You don’t seem the type. Education like yours, hell, you could be doing neurology.”

What could he say to that? “I like it here, sir.”

Besides, what they did in trauma at St Joseph’s wasn’t meatball surgery. Not really.  
His hip twinged sharply at the memory.

“Do you, now.” It wasn’t a question.

He answered it anyway. “Yes, I do.”

The older man grunted. “Where’s that accent from, Xavier?”

Charles was startled. “I beg your pardon, sir?”

“That accent. You ain’t from around here, that’s for damn sure.”

Inwardly, Charles raised an eyebrow at the man’s roughly rounded vowels. _I could say the same to you._

“I’m not sure I see the relevance, sir.”

“Maybe I just want to get to know my intern, Xavier, ever think of that? I hear in  
neurology, they take ‘em out to dinner at the end of their first month, the posh bastards. I’ve never been a fine dining sort of man myself, so here.” He shoved a small brown bag towards him.

Charles resisted the temptation to poke it with his cane to ensure it wasn’t explosive.

Surely there were rules about murdering interns.

He opened it, instead, pulling out a bottle of beer and a cigar.

“Well, go on, then. I didn’t give it to you to look at.”

Charles looked at him. “Do you have a bottle opener?”

The man grunted a laugh. “Give it here,” he said. Then, with a soft _shink_ , -something- popped out of his knuckles, blood welling up in thin lines. He used one of them to pry the top off the bottle, handing it back to Charles before retracting the- claws?- with a matching _shink_. The blood disappeared as the lines healed over instantly.

Charles gaped.

Dr Howlett was watching him, a curious expression on his face.

“That was-” Charles began, before choking on his tongue. “What- how- what _was_ that?”  
The doctor snorted. “I’m like you, kid. This morning. You were in that girl’s head, yeah?  
That’s how you got her to calm down.”

“I- how- how did you _know_?”

He smirked. “I’m older than I look. You ain’t the first mind-reader I met. What, did you think you were the only one?”

“No, I knew there were others, I just-” Other _telepaths_. He had never dreamed-

The doctor smiled, not unkindly. “Is it going to be a problem, Xavier?”

“Sir?” Charles was confused. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“What if that girl had died on the table?”

“She didn’t, sir.”

“But she could have, and you know it. It was close, for a while. Would you have been able to handle it?”

“Sir?”

“I’ve seen a telepath have a meltdown before. It ain’t pretty. And stop calling me ‘sir’. The name’s Logan, you might as well use it.”

“Yes, si- I mean, Logan.”

“You sure? Because we can just knock out a scared kid. I ain’t convinced that we’re as equipped to handle a panicking telepath.”

Charles took a swig of his beer, gesturing at his cane with his free hand. “Do you know  
how I got this?”

Logan nodded. “It was in your file.”

Charles swallowed and nodded. “If you’ve seen my file, you should know I-- I can handle it.  
It wouldn’t be the first time someone died while I was inside their mind. Sir.”

The other man looked at him, scrutinising as though seeing him for the very first time.

“Good,” he finally said, “Glad to hear it. Now, are you gonna smoke  
that cigar, or just let it look pretty?”

\----  
 _And it is 1944 and you try, you try so hard, to move the goddamn coin like you moved the gates and he is counting, forgive me mother forgive me, you can still save her you can do it you can move the coin MOTHER and she is dead and you aren't crying, you aren't, because the rage and anger that has been building up in your chest since 1936, since Ruthie died, since you moved to the Ghetto, since you met Magda in that schoolyard, since they beat your father and nobody moved to help him, since you became a smuggler, it is finally let loose and you scream and all the metal in the room vibrates, the helmets of the SS crunching around their heads and it is so easy, so easy,you could kill them all they deserve to die you could do it you could do it._

_It is 1945 and there are rumours that the camps will be liberated soon, and you are still alive. You have been bad, you have been wrong, and as punishment you are one of the Sonderkommando, reviled by all , and every day you escort people to their deaths, every day you look death in the eye and pray that you will be next, and you think of Magda, in the Gypsy camp, and you think of her eyes and her smile as you strip the gold from the teeth of the dead, as you load filthy bodies, desiccated and violated both, into the flames. You learn many things. You learn that the smell of burning corpse clings to everything, like the last whispers of a soul desperately holding on to earth. You watch thousands burning in great outdoor pits. You learn to combine the bodies of the old with those of young children to help them burn better. You want to die, you will die, there are ways of doing this, but first you write a letter, someone must be here, someone must bear witness, and you will be dead, and you end it with an order. 'Tell everyone who'll listen. Tell everyone who won't. Please. Don't let this happen again.' and with that, you rise to walk to your death, and-_

_it's not over, it begins again, the circle, and you watch your mother die and you scream and scream on the table when Shaw sticks needles in your brain, when he slices open your limbs carefully, hoping to find the secret of your giftcursegift, and after months and months of torture, you finally manage to escape, but they find you-_

_-and you're Sonderkommando, with no one to watch your back, hated by all, and you lead people to their deaths and collect their belongings, and every day you fear that the next body will be your sister, your brother, your uncle, until that day does actually come and you're too tired to care anymore, it is just another death, another loss to the burning flames and the showers that spray gas. And you learn, learn terrible things, ignore the violated women and children, the stains of semen on some of the corpses, and you do not cry when you realise that you will have to burn a blue-eyed infant with an elderly man who could have been your grandfather, because you never cry anymore._

_-And it's 1944 and your mother is dead and your father lies in a mass grave, but you know where your mother is buried because you dig it yourself, watch her poor broken body thrown in like so much trash, and you look at the bored expressions on the faces of the Nazi guards and tell yourself, 'I will never forget you,' because this war cannot last forever and when it is done you will find these people and they will pay._

_Shaw has you strapped to the table and there are needles in your spine and they are buzzing, spitting with hot electricity and pain, and you smile to yourself because he thinks he is breaking you but he is just making you harder to bruise._ _-And you're Sonderkommando, and you are starving, so hungry that you contemplate trapping one of the thousands of rats that gorge on the flesh of the dead and barely living, and you don't realise that some of the bodies you load into the crematorium are still alive, the gas not having been strong enough this time, not until you see the faint stirrings of breath in the last body, and for the first time since 1936 you recoil in horror and puke bile, burning bile, because you've had nothing to eat in-_

_-It is 1944 and your mother is dead and -_

Charles wakes with a gasp, the remnants of the psychic pain pounding in his ears. It has  not stopped- somewhere in this hospital someone is still trapped, he can feel it pounding against his shields; the psionic equivalent of a battering ram or a blood-curdling scream.

He shrugs on his dressing-gown and pushes his feet into his oxfords.

He knows he must look a sight, but he cannot bring himself to care. _That mind_ \- the panic  
floods his shields, threatening to overwhelm them with its intensity.

He feels the cold intensely, the damp cool of the hallways laying its aching fingers across his bones, but continues unabated. 

He does not bother being subtle, and as he moves through the dormitory he casually  
deepens the sleep of the other interns.

The pain gets louder as he approaches the ICU, his shields barely holding beneath the deluge of memories. The sterile glow of the nurses’ station is the only light, and he quickly ensures that the lone duty nurse remains engrossed in Kathy Holden’s adulterous relationship with a three-nippled bicycle salesman,  before continuing on to the place where the pain is greatest, the sheer force of emotion washing over his being like a tidal wave.

He forces himself to stop, to catch his breath, but he is shaking with adrenaline and pent-up emotion and a furious destructive empathy, and cannot wait long before he continues towards the room that holds that terrible animal pain. 

He pushes the flimsy wooden door open, and he’s not sure what he is expecting- whether he expected the source of the pain to be thrashing, screaming, fighting- but the room is quiet, peaceful.

All is silent save for a strange, homeostatic orchestra; the bass of the respirator combining with the soft metronome scratch of the ECG to form a low biological waltz.

A man lies motionless on a narrow hospital bed.

His face is young in the dim light- he cannot be much older than Charles himself, though his skin is lined and grey with illness.

He was clearly handsome once, but his young flesh is etched with lines of despair and hunger, lending him a wild and violent grace that is foreign to the faces of the truly young.

Charles sees this, and winces. His shields are not what they once were- Korea loosened them, damaged them somehow, the minds of a thousand men screaming and fucking and praying and dying- and the wave of pain threatens to overwhelm him.

He breathes deeply, as though about to submerge himself into water, and loosens his shields.

 

_It is 1944 and your mother is dead and you are afraid and you are hungry, and it feels like a fist gnawing and clawing at your insides, turning you into something not quite human, and every day you rise and pray to a being you no longer believe in and and-_

**Stop.**  
What?

The images dissolve before your eyes, leaving behind nothing but a sense of peace and the impression of warmth.

It’s a trick, it has to be, and you-

**Calm your mind. What is your name?**

You don’t have a name.

The voice- which manages to be both authoritative and calming at the same time, seems  
to smile- if a voice can be said to smile- and says

**It doesn’t matter. Sleep now, my friend. You are alright. Sleep.**

You feel at peace, and your heart slows to a normal speed.

You allow the darkness to reclaim you.

 

\-----

 

Charles resurfaced with a gasp, the alien memories and fears clinging to his body like ice water.

His head was pounding, his heart was racing, and part of it was adrenaline, yes, but there was something-  
l He allowed his head to rest against the wall, each breath restoring a semblance of sanity and clarity to the panicked fuzziness of foreign memory. 

He does not know how long he stood there, paralysed by the echoes of the mind before him, but eventually his leg began to twinge, and the illusion was shattered.

He stared at the man in the bed, at the steady, mechanical rise and fall of his chest.

He could help him. He could remove his pain, his loneliness, his hatred- and who would know? A natural result of severe head trauma, they would say. Unfortunate, but you will regain the memories in time.

And he would, if Charles were to help, but they would be different- the sharp acidity of pain removed, as though viewing them through plate glass or translucent vellum. What would he be, then? Would he be happy? Would he be loved? Would he-

Charles stopped, withdrew the tendrils of energy that he had unconsciously reached towards the comatose man.

He shook himself.

Charles Xavier is not a stupid man, and this, above all, he knows to be true- all men may be monsters. There’s nothing strange or special about that. The cruel, the hungry, the scared- it’s nothing new.

But some men- some men may be gods, and that is by far the more terrifying prospect.

(Three or ten or a hundred years ago, a boy who is not quite a man and who is and is not Charles Xavier screams, and an entire battalion goes silent.)

With a final push of psionic comfort, he pushed himself away from the wall, and limped back to the dormitory.  
\---

Raven was furious.

Charles told her in spurts and starts, half-hidden turns of phrase and imagery, whispers of thought and tendrils of emotion that convey the immediacy of the scene better than his fallible human tongue ever could.

When he was done, she set down her (terrible) coffee and stared at him, her wide eyes bright in her young face.

She was wearing lipstick, and it sharpened her features; Charles wondered what  
happened to the bouncing, open-faced girl he left behind in ‘51.

(The answer, were he ever to ask, is simple. She was left behind.)

Her eyes were cynical, and when she spoke, her words were neutrally damning, carrying the weight of a thousand half-remembered conversations they have had over the years.

“Charles,” she said, “You _can’t_.”

Charles purses his lips, and she continues, her voice so soft he has to strain to hear it, “They already have so many reasons to hate you. Don’t give them another one.”

He is not sure if it is her memories or his that add a hint of an English accent to her words.

He looked away, because her words- _his_ words- brush uncomfortably close to one of the many things that they do not talk about, and it makes his palms sweat.

He coughed, and lit a cigarette.

She smiled sharply and looked away. After a moment, she spoke again.

“I need to ask you for something.” She formed her words carefully, as though they were made of something fragile and ephemeral and dangerous, like smoke or ice.

He raised an eyebrow. “Oh? You sound serious.”

She shrugged. “I- I graduate this year, you know.”

Charles frowned, puzzled. “Yes, I know.”

“I was talking to Sister Anne today. She thinks I should go to college.”

Charles felt his eyebrows shoot up. “That- Raven, of _course_ you should, I didn’t even  
think- do you have any idea what you would go for?”

She fiddled with the strap of her leather book bag, the action robbing her of her false maturity.  
“I was thinking- I mean, I know my way around a hospital well enough- maybe I would follow in my big brother’s footsteps.”

Charles nodded slowly. “Well, I don’t know much about the process myself- but I’m sure we could talk to Jean, or one of the others- you’d make a wonderful nurse, Raven, I’m so-”

“-Charles.” Raven’s voice was annoyed. “That’s not what I meant. I want to be like you.”

Despite himself, Charles felt his eyebrows shoot up. “You want to be a surgeon?”

Raven nodded seriously.

“Are you sure?”

She glared at him.

Charles sighed inwardly and ran his fingers through his hair. “Alright. What do you need from me?”

“20 dollars and your permission to sign your name on some forms.”

“Raven!”

She smirked and traced a varnished coral fingernail across the cracked linoleum of the  
tabletop.

“Fine,” he groans, giving into the inevitable.

Her smile is blinding, and Charles knows in that moment that if they were different sort of people, she would have hugged him.

“Thank you,” She said earnestly.

He shrugged, checking his watch. “You’re welcome. I just realised- I need to leave, my shift starts in ten minutes. Sorry. Congratulations, my dear. I’m proud of you.”

She rolled her eyes, but sat up slightly straighter, her smile still firmly in place.

“Hey,” she said as he walked out the door. “You’re coming to my concert on Wednesday, right? Bring a date.”

Charles groaned theatrically as he slipped away into the night.  
\--

It was the rainiest November in living memory. On every corner, the storm drains threatened to overflow, spilling filthy water into the already sodden streets. It had been a relief to get outdoors- the hospital reeked, the unappetising scent of wet wool mixing with sweat and cigarettes to form a queasy vapour that nearly made him retch, let alone the patients. After that, the driving rain and bracing wind felt like a blessing- even as his shoes soaked through  and his hat wilted before his very eyes, the icy downpour making quick work of the cheap felt.

As he walked, the icy wind chilling his bones and igniting a hot, deep throb of pain along the joints, his thoughts unwillingly drifted to the man,his mind’s sharp and jagged edges clear even in memory.

He wasn’t thinking about it, he _wasn’t_ , because Charles was many things but stupid isn’t one of them, and that way lay dragons.

 _Think about tonight_ , he whispered to himself. _Think about Jean. Think about Raven. Think about-_

But those thoughts were uncomfortable, too, and bit at his soul in strange and different ways; the sharp flush of guilt he felt at Jean’s open admiration that he was taking advantage of, the strange throb of apprehension at the thought of Raven at medical school, _alone_ :

 

Charles is a modern man, would never dream of treating a female physician with anything other than professional courtesy or respect- if he had thought differently, once, Doctor McTaggart had quickly beaten it out of him- but he is uniquely suited to realise that very few of his male colleagues shared the sentiment.

It’s possible that Charles cares overly much about the feelings of others. It’s one of the reasons he makes a great doctor.

It’s also a factor in the sad reality of his sex life, but he tries quite hard not to look too deeply into that.

By the time he reached the rooming house, his coat was soaked through, and he was beginning to rue the decision not to take a taxi. It would be an indulgence, yes, and one he could hardly afford, but he would not have ended up on a date looking like a drowned rat or a small child or both. He rang the bell, and as he waited attempted to wring some of the water out his hat.

The woman who answered the door had the look of a beautiful woman gone slightly to seed, and the voice of a pack-a-day smoker. She looked him up and down, assessing him and finding him wanting.

“She didn't tell me she was expecting a caller,” she said flatly, her cigarette wobbling in her mouth.

Charles watched it dance with a kind of perverse fascination. “I'm sorry; are you sure she didn't mention me? I'm Charles Xavier- we work together.”

She scowled. “What kind of doctor don't have a car?”

Charles opened his mouth to respond, but was interrupted by a happy “Charles!”

They both turned to look. Charles drew in a breath.

She looked beautiful; her smooth red hair loosed from its no-nonsense bun and hanging in curls around her face, green skirt and white blouse carefully pressed and gleaming in the dim electric light.

The woman scowled. “He says he's calling for you, Jean. I told you once, I told you a thousand times- all visitors need to be approved at least twenty-four hours in advance, and anyways, I don’t like this one. He seems shifty.”

Jean laughed, and Charles felt himself strangely soothed by her presence. “I'm sorry, Mrs. Lennox. I should have told you, of course- but we're just leaving, so if you wouldn't mind-”  
she motions for Mrs Lennox to move aside, and, to Charles' surprise, she does so.

By the time they are halfway up the block, Charles is really, _really_ regretting the decision not to take a taxi. He said as much to Jean, who laughed and patted her head- the scarf she had tied around it to protect her hair was undoubtedly ruined- and said “There are worse things in life than rain, Charles.”

They continued on, chatting lightly. Doctor Howlett, does Charles like him? Yes, very much so, although he is a bit strange. And Jean, had she had a chance to work with Matron Frost? Was she as nasty as everyone said she was? Well, yes, but she had a good heart in her own way.

Charles opined that Jean probably thought that Stalin had a good heart, in his own way, then.

She shrugged daintily. “I like to think the best of people. There’s no harm in that, is there?”

Charles visibly resisted from flinching. _Liar betrayer coward look at this girl you don’t deserve she doesn’t deserve this isn’t you can’t- ___

Jean lays her gloved hand against his cheek, tracing the curved scar along his cheekbone.

Charles feels a strange, unnatural calm wash over him.

“Charles,” she said softly, and her musical voice is quiet, and serious. “I don’t expect anything. You realise that, right?”

Charles furrowed his brow. “I don’t-?”

She sighed. “Do you love me?”

“What? I- no, but-”

“-Good.” she said simply. “I don’t love you, either.  I agreed to this date because I am very fond of you, and because you seem like a nice man who deserves to spend time somewhere that isn’t a hospital. I’m not anticipating a proposal of marriage.”  
She smiled. “I would have thought that was obvious.”

Charles nodded slowly. “I’m sorry- I’ve been a bit of an arse, haven’t I?”

Jean smiled, and just like that things were back to normal. “Relax. You’re actually quite calm, for a surgeon.”

Things are better after that. They attend the concert, where Jean manages to charm all of Raven’s friends and quite a few of the nuns whom Charles remembers from his own schooldays- Sister Agathe, who seemed to consider cheerfulness an affront to God, actually smiled in their general direction- and Charles begins to relax.

By the time they are walking home, the rain has stopped, leaving in its place thin sheets of ice.

The city glistens in the lamplight, beautiful and deadly, and they were about halfway back to the rooming house when Jean glanced at him.

“I saw you in the ICU the other night,” she said mildly. “Was something wrong?”

Charles felt his stomach drop. His jaw clenched.

“What? No, no, why would anything have been wrong? I was just checking on a patient.”

“In the middle of the night?”

Charles felt his pulse increase. He had distracted them, he knew he had, why had Jean been able to see him, where had she been, for that matter- he hadn’t seen her or felt her-

She placed her hand on the crook of his elbow. _”Charles,”_ she says, and the light was such that her lips did not seem to move, _“It’s okay. I heard him too._ ”

Charles stopped mid step. “What?”

_“I’m like you.”_

That is when Charles realises that it wasn’t a trick of the light. Her lips weren’t moving.

_You can hear me._

_Yes._

“He’s always like that,” she speaks lowly, urgently, as though if she can not find the words they will simply disappear. “Always. Whenever I do my rounds, whenever I walk through that hall- I can hear him, and I try- I tried- to soothe him, but it never works for very long. Last night I could hear him all the way from the nurses’ quarters, and so I looked a little closer, and you were there, and he- stopped. All day today, and yesterday as well. He was calm. His pressure was normal. You did something, Charles. And I don’t know what you did, and I don’t know if it will last, but I know that the last forty-eight hours were the most sleep that man has had in a long time, and frankly I’m a little insulted that you thought I would report you for something like that.”

Charles paused, allowed the torrent of emotion to wash over him, drawing his own relief to the surface.

“To be fair,” he said slowly. “I didn’t know you were a telepath. You couldn’t have known what I was doing- I might have been wanking.”

Jean laughed, and blushed. “You shouldn’t say things like that to a lady,” she pointed out slyly.

“You’re a telepath,” Charles responded wryly, “Surely that means you’re exempt.”

She grinned, and Charles felt lighter than he had in weeks. Then she turned serious. “I could help you, you know.”

He frowned. “I’m sorry?”

She rolled her eyes. “If you wanted to go back.”

Charles felt a chill run down his spine. “Why would I do that?”

“You tell me,” She said, and reached over to push a piece of his hair back into place.

A bolt of lightning cracked through the inky darkness of the sky, illuminating her face like a flash photograph. She was beautiful.  
\---  
 _He couldn't breathe. Why couldn't he breathe? Something was choking him, something was there, he wasn't safe, he needed to move, he couldn't stay here-_

_**Hush. Everything is alright.** _

_A strange, diffuse sense of calm washed over him._

_He's dead. He must be dead. They've finally done it- they've finally won, he had survived more than the human heart should be able to bear, and still he died, nothing left to tell his story, nothing to prove that he had been, that he had lived-_

_**You're not dead. You're in a hospital.** _

_Hospital? Why would he be in a hospital- images flooded his mind, memories and nightmares both, and he began to panic even more._

_**Shh. You're safe here.** _

_That's a lie- he knows it. He's not safe- never safe, never able to rest, never able to stop. He needs to move, needs to get up, needs to find somewhere with cover and recuperate, needs to start fighting again- he's not safe, nobody is safe, safety is an illusion that people tell children about, something to lull them into a sense of security to make them more vulnerable, he's not-_

_**Please.** _

_For some reason, the- voice? Presence?- seems vaguely annoyed._

_**Well, rather. You're giving me a headache.** _

_This seemed unfair. He was in his head! He didn't ask for- for some demon or insanity-_

_**Well, that's quite enough of that. Be nice or I'll just send you back to sleep. You need rest.** _

_This didn't make any sense. How-  he wasn't dead, then, but- but gods aren’t real, he learned that long ago, so that didn't make sense- Magda, beautiful lost Magda, she had believed, but he couldn't, not anymore, just one more thing he lost that cold night in Austria-_

_**I don't wish to intrude-** an ironic statement if there ever was one- **But I feel I should tell you, I am not a god. Just a man. Not a demon. Just a man.**_

_How are you here?_

_He was hallucinating, he must be, that's the only thing that made any sense._

_**I'm... gifted. Like you.** _

_Like...? he began to panic, thinking of that night, thinking of his power and how it lost him everything, thinking-_

_**It’s not like that. You’re not- there are many like you. Hundreds- thousands even-** _

_A strange sensation then, as though leafing through the pages of a book, faces- furred, covered in scales, shifting eyes- red and green and coal black, glinting metal and glowing light, a girl- beautiful, dark-skinned, flying in the night sky, dragonfly wings backlight by a glowing yellow moon._

_**You're not alone.** _

_It was a strange feeling, this- this-_

_Who are you?_

_The presence seemed to flicker in and out of existence._

_**I'm terribly sorry; it seems I have to leave. Try and get some rest. You're going to need it.** _

Wait! Why-

The thoughts faded away as a wave of intractable exhaustion washed over him, reducing the grey smog to darkness.

“Xavier!”

Charles jerked into the present with a start. “Yes, ever so sorry, what is it?”

Doctor Howlett stared at him suspiciously. “Whatcha doing there, bub?”

Charles shook his head. “N-nothing, sir. Just. Resting, sir.”

“In a patient's room? He's not even one of yours.”

Charles shrugged uncomfortably. “Whose is he, then?”

Doctor Howlett pursed his lips. “Doctor Adler, I believe- so she doesn't know you're in here?”

Charles pointedly inspected his nails. “Well. I mean to say- not as such, but very little seems to escape her notice, so-”

Doctor Howlett scowled. “Is this some sort of-”

Charles felt his stomach clench. “Some sort of what, sir?”

“-some sort of telepath thing? Always said you were strange buggers. Served with a couple in the War, you know.”

Charles nodded earnestly, not taking his eyes off the other man. “Yes. Sir. A telepath thing.”

Doctor Howlett grunted, glancing at the chart on the end of the bed. “Been through the wars, this one.”

 _You have no idea_ , Charles didn't say.

“Yes, sir.”

“I thought I told you not to call me that, kid.”

“Yes si- Doctor.”

Doctor Howlett rolled his eyes. “Well, come on then. You're wanted in OT4. Get your ass in gear. You can do this- thing later.”  
\-------------  
“Charles?”

“Mm?” Charles did not open his eyes. He'd been working since 6 that morning- he'd earned this, dammit.

“You were talking again.”

With a groan, Charles forced his eyes open, blinking away the grit to see the equally pale and tired face of Hank.

“Was I? So sorry about that. I'll try not to in future.”

Hank wrinkled his brow. “How are you going to that?”

“I'm sure I'll think of something.”

Charles sat up in bed, feeling his various joints pop and crack. He arched his back.

“I think I'll go fetch a hot drink. Would you like anything?”

Hank shook his head. “I think I just need sleep, thanks.”

“Was I keeping you up?”

Hank raised an eyebrow. “You were _talking_ , Charles.”

“I don't recall.”

It was true. He didn't. “Did I say anything interesting, then?”

Hank shrugged. “Mumbled, mostly. I didn't hear.”

“Right.”

Charles pushed himself out of bed, leaning on his cane. “I'm terribly sorry, Hank.”

Hank waved a hand. “It doesn't matter. Just- try and get some actual rest, okay? So the rest of us can do the same?”

Charles smiled, and walked out the room.

He didn't end up in the cafeteria, of course.  
\---  
He didn't mean to make a habit of it. There was something about the man, though- something that drew him nearer, like the spider draws its web, something unavoidable and profound. His mind was sharp, yes, jagged in a way that Charles was unused to, but it was also- strangely cool, like liquid mercury.

More and more, Charles found himself sojourning to the man- _Erik_ 's room, to (he told himself) try and provide some relief to the troubled soul, to speed his healing and deepen his rest.  
 _Everything was grey, a soothing and artificial nothingness, the tasteless, heavy sleep of the narcotised or drunken._

_The fog was all encompassing, just opening his eyes took effort, and yet-_

_Just beyond the horizon, too far for him to reach, he felt it. The edges were frayed and fading, and beyond- beyond  
A woman screams, and screams, calling for her son- and then she doesn’t and that is far worse, because that means it is over, that she has given up, and there are mutters, whispers, that they’re going to purge the gypsy camp next week and you are helpless, so helpless, you are just a cog, and every night you hear the screams and the silence-  
The fires aren’t hot enough to burn bone, and every morning the ground is covered in soot, in ashes and in despair; nobody looks too closely at the hard chunks of something  
that is not stone that appear in the water barrel after one of the terrible grey rainstorms.  
But you can’t reach, you can’t get there, and you try but all you see is grey fog, all you feel is an artificial contentment, and you want to scream with rage and despair but you _ can’t _, because something is calling you, pulling you back to slumber, and you feel the strange, calming presence in the corner of your mind, and before it is strong enough, before it pulls you under, you lash out at it, kicking and screaming, because_ it has no right _._

_**Calm yourself, Erik.** _

__I don’t want to be calm. __

_The presence seems to recoil. **Why not?**_

_Because he’s not worthy. Because he’ll never leave this place if he is. Because it’s better to feel pain, to feel rage, than to feel nothing at all._

__Who do you think you are?

_Despite its claims to the contrary, Erik is still not entirely certain it is not a god- and if it is his maker, Erik will meet him with his chin up and his fists blazing. He has far too many crimes to answer for._

_(So has Erik)_

_**I’m a doctor. I’m trying to**_ help _you._

 __So you’ve said. You’re not helping me, leaving me like this. I can’t- I must-

An image floats over the grey like a mirage, a pale, brown-haired woman, her face weathered before her time, clutching a pair of squalling infants, her eyes wet with tears and horror.

**Who is she?**

Erik has had so many names, so many papers- a life, still young and half-lived, segmented by a series of identity cards. Magda has only ever had one.

She- someone I lost. A long time ago. I have to find her. __

_The presence is silent for a long time, so much so, that, were it not for the artificial calm of the mist, Erik would suspect it had withdrawn entirely._

_**This woman. Your wife, I presume?** _

_The irony of the question, as though Erik had a choice in the divulging of information, is not lost on him._

__Yes. I have to find her. We- here words fail him, and the mist is once again invaded, this time by a girl so thin she looks like a skeleton, lying motionless and half-insensible among the piles of the bodies, where Erik had told her to hide, and as he touches her cheek he screams inside that he may be too late-

**You need to heal.**

It didn’t understand. Erik hadn’t expected it to.

He felt the presence begin to withdraw, with a final whisper. **My name is Charles, by the way.**

 

\-----

_You should wake up, you know._

It was two weeks to the day since Charles had first encountered him.

_Why? There's nothing for me out there._

Flashes, then- a fire, a screaming child, a family lost to the bitter cold of a November night, the satisfaction at the deaths of the men who were responsible for the deaths of-

_That's not true._

_A bustling city, then, people screaming and laughing and fucking and dying, a library stacked with books- Erik snorted- a baby, a beautiful little red-headed girl, and she looks enough like Anya that Erik forgets to breathe, even in his mind-_

_Go away, Charles. You don't know what you're talking about._

He keeps away for a while, after that, and when he finally does return nearly a week has passed, and Erik is still comatose.

 _They think you're brain-dead_ Charles points out one day.

_So?_

_They'll just give up on you, you know,_ Charles continues mercilessly _They’ll turn everything off and leave you to die. This is a charity hospital, we can't afford to keep a bed for someone who isn't even going to make an effort._

There was an element of truth to that- how large an element, Erik did not need to know.

_Fine. Let them. I don't-_

_he had lost everything, lost everyone, even Magda, his beautiful Magda, had left him, and he couldn't find her, couldn't know where she was or what she was doing. How could he-_

_Erik. She is still alive. You could always-_

_-what?_

_-someone's here. I have to go._

When Charles resurfaced, he winced. The Matron stood there, the light streaming on to her white uniform like an avenging angel in a Christmas pantomime.

Charles braced himself. “Ma’am, I-”

The matron rolled her eyes. “Don’t be stupid, Charles.”

Charles stared. “I’m sorry?”

The matron’s eyes flickered gold. “It’s me.”

Charles blinked. “Raven? What are you doing here- it’s dangerous! How did you find me?”

“I ran into your girlfriend at the nurse’s station. She said you spend a lot of time here.”

“She’s not my-” Charles caught up with the end of that sentence. “Wait, what?”

“I wondered where you’d been. Hank’s been worried.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Charles said coldly.

“He said you’re always disappearing. And… something about… dreams, was it?” The false casualty of her voice grated in his ears.

She takes a step closer, blue eyes opened wide. Thick blonde lashes flutter guilelessly against her porcelain skin, like some kind of sick china dolly.

Charles shut his eyes. “Raven, it’s not- Hank shouldn’t have told you. It’s none of your concern.”

“None of my concern?” her voice is low, now, and in that voice, it comes out as a feral purr, all sweetness and light banished from the tone. “Shall I remind you, Charles, about last time? Shall I recite the list? Jared McCullough, Sean Flaherty, Ethan Strange, Sarah White, Hanna Reardon, Mikey Campbell- that’s just the last decade, Charles. You can’t do this- you have limits, and besides, you’re still-“

Charles, who had remained calm during her furious recitation of names, her roll-call of the damned and the forgotten, went white.

His eyes flashed.

“Still what, Raven?” As pleasantly as though he was discussing the weather.

“I-“ she faltered, for once seemingly at a loss for words. “I don’t- I’m _scared_ for you.“

Charles sighed, the fight abruptly drained out of him. “What do you want from me, Raven?”

When he met her eyes, they were gold and terrified, and Charles cursed himself for forgetting how _young_ she was, how protected she had been.

“I don’t know, Charles.”  
She sounded lost, then, as though Charles, who has only ever been as good as he ought to be, has in some way deceived her.  
She stepped forward when Charles opened his arms, and clutched him tight against her chest.  
“I feel like you've gone away again,” Raven whispered. “And this time I have to watch. It's like you're not even _here_ , Charles, and I can't-- I can't--”

She pressed her lips together, cutting off the flow of words. 

Charles held her tighter. She was so young. 

(So was he)

“I'm sorry, Raven,” he whispered roughly. “I'm still here.”

“I'm still here.” 

\----

“Doctor Xavier, you’re needed in operating theatre 3. I repeat, Doctor Xavier, your presence is required in operating theatre 3.”

Charles groaned exaggeratedly into his mug of coffee. “I’m on break!” he muttered at the open air from his place on the stoop.

Armando snickered into his sleeve, and Sean punched his shoulder playfully. “Come on, boy genius. Didn’t you hear? You’re _needed_.”

“I’ve been on since 10 last night! Surely I’m deserving of fifteen minutes at least.”

Armando shrugged philosophically. “Guess they think you’re good, Xavier.”

“That’s hardly my fault!” Charles whined. “Why should I suffer for other people’s incompetence?”

“Don’t be an asshole,” Sean snorted. “You don’t see us complaining.”

“You get paid, and work hours meant for human beings. I didn’t work this many hours when I was in the _Army_ , and we were at war.”

Sean shrugged. “You should organise. You know, like the nurses are.”

Charles glanced at him. “Careful who hears you with talk like that. Besides, as a group, residents aren’t exactly noted for our collectivist spirit.”

Sean rolled his eyes and flicked a bit of ash away from his cigarette. “You’d better get down there.”

Charles groaned a little as he braced himself against the wall and pushed, the joints of his knees clicking audibly.

By the time he got to the OR, he had shaken off the last vestiges of fatigue. The  OR was noisily crowded, and as Charles pushed his way through the collected nurses, he winced.  
The boy- and it was a boy, no more than 12 or 13 at the most- was clearly in agony, twisting and turning and moaning.

“Why isn’t he sedated?” Charles asked, slipping next to the bed.

Jean glanced at him. “He won’t let us near him. We were going to call for an orderly, but Dr Logan suggested we call you instead.”

Charles raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

She smiled slightly. “He seems to think that your- ways with children- could serve us well here.”

Charles pursed his lips. Projecting a diffuse atmosphere of calm, he laid a hand against the boys thin chest.

“What’s his name?” He asked, glancing over his shoulder.

“Bobby,” a dark-haired nurse supplied.

“Bobby,” Charles said, speaking slowly and clearly and projecting certainty, “My name is Doctor Xavier. We’re going to help you, okay? We’re going to make you all better, but you have to let us do our job.”

“...Hurts.” The boy mumbled.

Charles projected more strongly, pressing exhaustion and compliance into the boys painful limbs. “I know it does, Bobby. That’s why you need to let us help you. You have to be brave, okay? Will you be brave for me? “

Blearily, the boy nodded, his face twisting in pain as even that small movement set off a fiery agony.

Charles glanced back at the nurses. “I think he’ll let you sedate him now.”

The nurses moved in quickly, attaching an IV, and the anaesthetist moved forward and pressed the ether mask to his face.

“Since you’re here, Xavier,” Doctor Howlett began, “You may as well assist with the surgery- unless you have somewhere more important to be?”

Charles shook his head and straightened, doing his best to hide his shaking hands in his pockets.

The older man scrutinised him, his dark brows drawing together like beetles. “You’re not looking so good, there, Xavier.”

Charles bit his tongue. “I’m fine, sir.”

“No, you’re not,” Dr Howlett said conversationally. “Tell you what, Xavier. Why don’t you head out to the waiting room and explain the procedure to next of kin, then go get some rest. What time did you start at?”

“10 o’clock, sir.”

“10 yesterday?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Alright, then. Get your skinny ass out to the waiting room and confer with next of kin, understood?”

Charles felt his shoulders drop with relief. “Yes, sir. Right away.”

Charles pushed his way past the nurses again, tossing his latex gloves into a bin by the door.

The waiting room was packed and smoky, stinking of unwashed bodies and damp wool.

As he approached, the din of the room fell to a low murmur as everyone craned to look at the man in scrubs.

“The next-of-kin for Bobby Drake? Are you in here?”

From the corner, a short, thin woman pushed herself out of her seat. Her dark eyes were large in a lined face, and her slightly threadbare blouse was meticulously pressed.

She had clearly been beautiful once, and still was, in a weary and careworn way. “I am from the agency. Bobby has no family.”

Her words were heavily accented, the consonants chewed and then released like a piece of crackling pork.

“You’re licensed to make medical decisions for him, though?”

“I am from the agency,” she repeated, “We are licensed to make decisions for all of the orphans in our care.”

“What agency is that, then?”

“The Society for Displaced Children. I am Bobby’s placement worker.”

“Right,” Charles said, “Now, if you wouldn’t mind stepping out into the hall with me for a moment, Mrs-“

“Maximoff,” the woman said. “Magda Maximoff.”  
\----


	2. Chapter 2

_The windiest militant trash  
Important Persons shout  
Is not so crude as our wish:  
What mad Nijinsky wrote  
About Diaghilev  
Is true of the normal heart;  
For the error bred in the bone  
Of each woman and each man  
Craves what it cannot have,  
Not universal love  
But to be loved alone.  
-WH Auden, September 1, 1939_

 

 

 

Charles blinked. “Excuse me?”

She drew herself up stiffly, chin tilted. “I am Magda Maximoff. You are Bobby’s doctor, yes? Now that we have introduced ourselves, may we move to finding the problem?”

Charles shook his head. It was probably nothing. There were a million women in the world with brown eyes and troubled skin, thousands in Brooklyn alone, and Magda was not an uncommon name.

“Mrs Maximoff, may I ask- what type of work does your agency do?”

She eyed him warily, tucking her shawl tighter around her slim shoulders. “We work out of 32nd Street- you are familiar? We help children and unwed mothers find homes and opportunities.”

Her forehead wrinkled. “Why are you asking me these questions, doctor? I thought you wanted to speak about Bobby.”

Charles smiled, forced himself to relax, and projected a warm wave of calm. “I’m sorry, Mrs Maximoff. About Bobby- he suffered some quite serious injuries, I’m afraid to say, the impact of the truck seems to have damaged his intestines, and we will almost certainly have to perform a colostomy. That means-”

“I know what you mean, Doctor Xavier. I am smarter than I look.”

“I’m sure you are, Mrs Maximoff- I didn’t mean to imply- I would hardly expect someone without any medical training to know-“

She watched in stony silence as he stumbled over his words.

“The nurse told me.” She said, and when she smiled her face seemed to smooth out, her eyes lighten. She was not much older than Charles himself, then.

“I- ah, I see- still, I should apologise for underestimating-“

She stopped  him with a touch on his arm. “Why did you go to medical school, doctor?”

His mouth went dry. “Excuse me?”

She smiled, but her look was sharp and assessing. “Why did you want to be a doctor?”

“Is that really- I mean, why do you ask?”

She shrugs.

“I suppose I- well- I always enjoyed science-“

Her lips tightened.

“-but,” he said hurriedly, “I suppose that I thought that I could- help. In some way. I wanted to learn how to, to fix what’s broken. Humans are very fragile creatures.” 

He laughed, awkwardly.

She eyed him seriously. “Yes,” she says gravely. “We are.” She removed her hand from his arm, and he found himself slightly missing the warmth. “Thank you, doctor.”

Clearly dismissing him, she turned, and walked back into the waiting room.

 

Charles made his way back to the dorms slowly, his breath misting in the cool air. It was strange, to be alone in the wide room in the daytime. The sun streamed in from the grimy window panes, casting the whole room in a dusty light. Hissing, he eased himself down onto his bunk, carefully removing his scrubs. As he inched his waistband down past worried flesh, he bit back a hiss.

Bracing himself, he glanced at his hip. The scar- a worn, knotted thing, speaking both of the initial bullet and the three subsequent surgeries to remove necrotised tissue- was red and inflamed, the heat palpable. As he watched, the flesh jumped, and Charles bit back a curse as the muscles spasmed tightly.  
He reached down and lifted his ankle with his right hand, the other supporting the knee and lower thigh. Slowly, carefully, he began to stretch it out, biting off curses as the muscles relaxed and untangled. Finally, when it was loose enough that he could move, even slightly, he reached beneath the mattress to pull out a small glass bottle. Rubbing the liniment into his hands, he began carefully stroking the affected area, feeling the burning cool of the oil soak into his joints and ease the ache.

As he did so, the muscles in his neck relaxed as well, until at last he found he was able to lie down, staring at the ceiling through heavy eyes. Unbidden, his thoughts drifted to Erik, his pallor and illness in real life cast over with the steely glow of the astral plane.  
Without letting himself analyse it, he prodded at the image, turned it over, ignoring the bolt of heat the act shot to his groin. Absentmindedly, he reached across the bed and manoeuvred the blankets over himself, wiping his hands scrupulously until no trace of liniment remained.

Quickly, and without a great deal of reflection, he found himself reaching beneath the elastic of his briefs, feeling the cool prickle of pubic hair contrast with the warmth of his cock. He wrapped his fingers around it, his thumb stroking the underside gently.

The image of Erik sprung to his mind again- not as he was, shadowed and bruised in a hospital bed, but as he could be, as he appeared in the astral plane- a strong jaw and sharp blue eyes, their intensity almost blinding, his tanned biceps gleaming in the glow of his aura.

His breath quickened, and, despite himself, he found himself nudging his hips forward, trying to gain traction in his hand. Each inch was agony.

Instead, Charles gripped harder, and began to stroke, slow, and steady, feeling the heat building behind his hips as he pictures Erik, his Erik, Astral Erik, alive and well, walking the streets of New York with him- laughing with him, shouting at him, kissing him; imagined the feel of the other man's hands, rough with callouses that spoke of manual labour and danger, as they ran over the damaged and soft flesh of his torso, and he stroked faster and faster as Astral Erik pushed him down into bed- a real bed, with a down mattress and cotton sheets, and bobbed down beneath Charles legs, his mouth swallowing him whole, and-

Charles came with a bitten back sigh and a bleary smile, as he drifted into slumber.  
He quickly cleaned himself, disposing of the tissues in a wastepaper bin. 

His last thought, as he went to sleep, was of the Astral plane.  
\---  
Something was different this time.

The door was open, and nurses bustled in and out. Surely he hadn’t- Charles would have known if he died.

“Marie?” Charles asked, touching the shoulder of one of the younger nurses. She jerked away. “It is Marie, isn’t it?”

She bit her lip, clearly trying to force back her thoughts. “Yes, Doctor Xavier,” she said flatly.

“Marie, what’s going on in there?”

She eyed him curiously. “I thought you were with Doctor Howlett.”

Charles smiled. “I am. Yes, of course I am, and he wanted me to check on Er- on the John Doe. What’s his status?”

“Well, he ain’t a John Doe anymore, is he?” she said with a slight smile.

“I’m- sorry?”

“He woke up. Says his name’s Joseph. He’s from Queens.”

“Oh,” Charles said, slowly. “And is he- how’s his health?”

Marie shrugged. “I’m not a doctor, Xavier, Doctor Adler is in there right now. You better git before she sees you skulking around the door.”

“Right, sorry, Marie,” Charles said apologetically as he headed towards the lift.

Marie grunted a reply that Charles couldn’t hear.

Erik was awake. 

The rest of the day passed in a dim blur, the cases running together in a smear of anxious industry. Erik was awake. _Erik was awake_. He could-

_could what, Xavier? Fuck him? He’s ill, he’s--That's not what he wants, and it's not your decision-  
_

but it could be. It could be. He could just-

he stopped himself before going any further. Because he _could_ , yes, he could, but it wouldn't be the same. Not for any philosophical reason, although Charles likes to think he has a slightly better grasp of basic morality than that, but he's lied to himself before- but because, if Charles is being perfectly and brutally honest, that's not what he wants.

If all Charles wanted was a hard fuck (logistics aside, the man's been in a coma for weeks, arousal and muscle atrophy do not a happy mix make) then he could have had him, or if not him, someone else, could have taken the bus across town to Giovanni's and picked someone up; and there were risks involved, and it wouldn't have been perfect, but it would have been something.

 

But Charles' finds, to his own horror, that his thoughts are increasingly obsessed with Erik, teasing aside the knots of his subconscious to find- what?

 

_what do you know about me?_

_Everything._

 

but knowledge and affection are not the same thing, and Charles has learned through brutal experience that some things can be changed, in the brain, through the application of the hammer or the rope, but love is not one of them. Obsession, gratitude, lust, desire- all of these may be chiseled finely onto neuronal tissue, triggered with a whisper or with a thought, but love is something else.

 

Well. That's getting rather ahead of himself, anyway. Charles will visit him, as he has done every night for the last two weeks- just because he is no longer in a coma does not mean that his skills will not be needed.

 

He frowns at the folder in his hand, making a few pencilled notations in the margins. He did not jump at the sudden hand on his shoulder, but it was a near thing.

“Charles?”

He jerked his head around, accidentally brushing the soft hand with his rough chin. It was quickly withdrawn.

It smelled of ivory soap and disinfectant.

“Jean,” Charles said, forcing a sudden tautness out of voice. “What can I do for you?”

Jean smiled ruefully. “Doctor Logan asked me to give you a message. He says he wants you to work the clinic this shift.”

Charles raised an eyebrow. “I thought Hank was working tonight.”

 

She shrugged. “I'm just passing the message along. He wants you down there as soon as possible.”

“Right...” Straightening up, Charles self-consciously brushed the wrinkles out of his ill-fitting trousers and buttoned his white coat.

As he pushed past, she grabbed his wrist.

_I heard he's awake._

_Who?_

_Charles, are you actually trying to lie to me telepathically?_

_Is it working?_

_No._

 

“Well, it was worth a try,” he muttered, and walked out the door.

 

The clinic was crowded and smokey, and by the time Charles had sequestered himself in one of the examining rooms and told the nurse to being calling patients, he was sweating slightly.

He glanced at the file in his hand, at the incomplete case history taken by a previous resident, and suppressed a wince at the stark information therein. A brief cough brought him out of his thoughts, and he glanced up to see a familiar face tensed in anxiety. 

“Mrs Maximoff?” Charles raised an eyebrow, but smiled slightly. _Calm, superior, warm,_ Charles chanted at himself. _Don't use large words, don't frown, don't screw this up._

 

“It's good to see you again.”

 

She eyed him suspiciously. “Indeed, doctor. I am pleased to see you as well.”

 

Charles looked away. “What seems to be the problem, then?”

She flushed and stared out the window. “I am having-- female problems.”

Charles smiled encouragingly. “I see. Alright, Mrs Maximoff, I'm going to have to ask you some rather personal questions.”

“I understand.”

“Good. Now, before I get any further- I must ask, is your husband with you?”

She stared at him flatly. “My husband is gone.”

“Oh. I'm so sorry, ma'am, I just assumed- you're a widow, then.”

“No.” She shook her head. “My husband is not dead. He is just gone. I have not seen him for many years.”

“Ah.” Charles cleared his throat. “Who- I a pologise, but I do need to ask- is there any possibility you could be pregnant?”

She blushed. “It-yes. That could- yes.”

 

“Are you sexually active?”

 

A nod.

“Do you have any children?”

A pained compression of the lips creased her face. “I- yes. I do.”

“And their ages?” Charles had picked up a pen, and was writing intently.

“Six. Twins. Wanda and Pietro. I had another, but she died.” The words were said flatly, distantly, as though they had been repeated so many times that they had lost their meaning.

“My condolences, Mrs Maximoff. And your husband?”

“He left. After Anya. He couldn't-”

“I see. Did you have any problems carrying them?”

She shook her head. “No, doctor, they were fine. Healthy babies.”

“And how did your daughter die?”

She went pale. “Is that really relevant, doctor?”

“It could be,” Charles said patiently.

She shook her head. “No. No, it is not.”

“Please, ma'am-” She jerked her chin, her eyes flashing. “They killed her, Doctor Xavier. We had finally found a place, we were finally free, and they killed her. Because she was the daughter of a Jew and a Roma. They burned our home to the ground, and they took Anya with it, and they would not let Max rescue her, no matter how he struggled- _they killed her_ , Doctor, so, no, I do not think that it is relevant.”  
`  
She was projecting so strongly that Charles had to grab the edge of his stick to ground himself in the present.  
 _The night was dark, and cold, the wind so strong that it seemed as though the Austrian winter would cut you in two, but she did not shiver. She was used to it, after Auschwitz, and at least this time she had a coat, and shoes, and a dress that fits._

_The light from the flames reflects off the snow, blinding her, and the smoke chokes her throat as she presses the twins tightly to her chest._

_She can see Max from the corner of her eye, struggling to escape the holds of the men who hold him, can hear the wailing cries of Anya, and she screams at Max and the men at at Max's god who has forsaken them. Not again. Please, no more. No more._

_The cries stop._

_The night is silent, until a horrible cry rends the air, like a wounded beast. Max.  
He breaks free, and lightning seems to spark in his eyes, and the earth seems to growl with a furious anger. She blinks, because this can not be real, this must be a dream, and Max is screaming and the men are dying, bludgeoned to death by-  
what._

_He screams and screams, and the shaking does not stop until the men are dead, lying on the ground in their own blood, and she stares at him, horrified at this god-like creature made mortal by the flames' destructive glow._

_His face is shadowed, but there is a manic light in his eyes, grief and anger too, and something else, something animal, and it is this that makes her recoil and shriek, and when he comes forward to comfort her, she pushes him away and she runs.  
_  
Charles blinks, because although the manic glint was unfamiliar, the face rent with that terrible animal rage was.  
 _Erik_.

He could scarcely breathe, and something of it must have showed on his face, because the woman turned to look him in the eye.

“Doctor Xavier?” she said, brow furrowing. “Are you alright?”

“What?” He blinked. “Yes- oh, yes, I'm fine, thank you. Now, I'm going to have to ask you to change into a gown, I'd like to do an examination.”  
\---

Charles meant to return. Really he did. But one thing led to another, and the clinic was busy, and by the time Sean stuck his head in and invited him out for a coffee, it was past six o'clock and his bones were aching.  
He agreed anyway, and as they made their way out into the grey December night, Sean punched him in the shoulder in glee.

“Did you see her?”

Charles raised an eyebrow.

“Who?”

“Dr Mactaggert. The tits on her, man, you must have-”

Charles glances at him wryly. “Please, Sean, stop, I was her trainee, I'll be traumatised for life.”

“You were her trainee? D'you think you could put a good word in for me?”

“Erm...” Charles trailed off, glancing at the young man's eager expression, his cheeks bright pink with cold. “...Probably? I doubt she cares much for my opinion on- well, on anything, but on romantic matters in particular- but I can certainly try.”

“Thanks man, thanks.” They trudged on in silence for a while, before Charles stopped.

“Sean?”

“Mm?”

“Where precisely are we going?”

“This great new place, it's just around the corner, the Black Canary, have you heard of it?”

Charles laughed out loud. “Is that the place on 13th? ”

“Oh,” Sean deflated slightly. “So you've heard of it, then.”

“You fucking red,” Charles swore tiredly, but with affection. “I can't be seen some place like that, it's right next door to Party headquarters, can you imagine?”

“Like that's ever stopped you before.”

Charles stopped stark still. “I beg your pardon?”

“I've heard you like to hang round Giovanni's-- if you really cared about your reputation, you wouldn't-”

Sean broke off as he glimpsed the look of frozen horror on Charles' face.

“-Oh, no, man, no, it's not like that, I don't care, I know the bartender, that's all, he comes to meetings sometimes, and I was picking him up and I saw your coat, that's all, nobody would know if- I wouldn't know if I hadn’t seen it myself, no, you've got it wrong-”

Charles flinched, and reminded himself to breathe. As his brain caught up with his ears, he snagged on the middle of the sentence. “Meetings?”

Sean glanced at him, suddenly at ease. “You know, man. For the Party.”

Charles clapped his hand over his eyes. “You, my friend, are a dangerous man to know.”

Sean grinned. “And you aren't?”

“Touché,” Charles muttered softly, as they ducked behind a painted blue door.

The café was dimly lit, and smoky, ceramic mugs rattling in chipped saucers as the caffeinated steam mixed with the nicotine haze to form a noxious substance that permeated the flesh and sunk warm fingers into Charles' aching frame. 

“Sean!” A smiling Latina woman called from behind the counter. “Have a seat, man, you're just in time for the show.”

“Thank, Angel,” Sean said, flashing her a blinding grin. “Charles, say hello,” he prompted, when Charles was silent.

“What?” he murmured. “Oh, yes, sorry, hello, my dear, it's a pleasure-”

She smirked. “Save it, babydoll, I'm spoken for.” She waggled her finger, on which glinted a plain gold band.

Charles blushed. “Oh, no, I didn't mean- I'm sorry, that wasn't my intention at all.”

She laughed, a low, molasses-syrup sound. “I'm just teasing you, Charlie. Siddown. What can I get for you?”

“Just coffee, thanks.” He said with a smile, as he eased himself into a rickety chair.

She returned a moment later with his cup, and he sipped cautiously, allowing the hot liquid to sear his insides and return him to a state of equilibrium.

Sean had taken the opportunity to chat with one of the other patrons, a slender man with unruly black-  
 _oh, no_

Charles flushed and looked studiously at his coffee cup, admiring the stained ceramic's dull burnish.

“Charles!” Sean caught his eye with a grin. “Stop being such a wallflower. Here, this is Jean-Paul. Jean-Paul, this is-”

“Charles,” the man said with a smirk. “Yes, you said.”

His blue eyes flashed at Charles embarrassed stutter.

(He had said his name was Mark, that night.)

 

“Indeed” Charles said, straightening his back and setting his cup on the scarred wood of the table. 

“You're French, then?”  
(There had been very little time for small talk.)

“Canadien,” he said with an easy grin. “Not that I would... expect un Américain to know the difference. Is fine, though.” He winked. “ _Very_ fine.”

 

Sean's eyebrows shot up. Charles coughed.

“Yeah,” Sean said after a minute. “Well. JP here is one of the best assets we have at HQ. He writes like a god.”

Charles pursed his lips. “Sean, do you-” _Did he have no sense of discretion? Or did he just not care?_

Charles looked at his smile, at the soft smirk on Jean-Paul’s face, and he felt- nothing. It was as though there was  a veil, a grey curtain drawn over the scene muting even the sparkle of the other man’s eyes, the sounds of laughter and the sharp burn of cigarette smoke. He couldn’t- 

“Yeah, Charles, I do,” and the good humour was gone from his voice now. “Surprisingly enough, it has not escaped my _fucking_ notice that they drag a few of us off every day, that we have to keep moving our headquarters so they don’t raid us on charges of, of treason or of-- I was there. And I know you think that we should all just, just duck our heads and carry on, but-”

“You’re wrong,” he said flatly, and noted with a bloodless interest that Jean-Pierre had moved back to allow unfettered access to the youngest man’s eyeline. “That is _not_ what I think, Sean.”

“Like Hell you don’t! You’re a fucking doctor, for Christ’s sake-”

“Sean.” Charles’ voice is flat and cold. “I’m making allowances for you because you’re young, do you understand? And I appreciate that enthusiasm. God knows I remember it, although I suspect you might rather disagree with the direction in which I applied it. And-”

He faltered. He couldn’t explain this to him. The 5 years between them stretched like an endless chasm, because- because while Charles was old enough to remember the bombs, the air raid sirens’ bitter wails as the ground shook and people projected so strongly that Charles was one and all and none at the same time, and old enough to remember the routine that had fallen, after a time- _Let us then brace ourselves, so that, if Britain and her Commonwealths should last a thousand years, men will still say, this was their finest hour_ \- and, well, Charles has always been a moderate believer in stoicism, although he’s old enough now not to believe himself exempt from the storms of emotionalism-- but Sean doesn’t remember that. He remembers the aftermath, the strikes and shattered people, and Charles winces, because _he understands_ , but that does not mean he approves. 

-“And I sympathise with your fight, I really do. But you must be _cautious_. Change does not come at the tip of a knife, or at the barrel of a gun. It never has, not successfully; you can ask the people of the Ukraine if you’re curious. But-”

Sean was turning away, his mouth compressed in a bitter line of disappointment. “I thought you’d understand.”

Charles smiled softly. “I do, Sean. I’ve read Engels too. I’m not suggesting that your fight isn’t, to some extent, a just one, although I- it’s possible I have too many associations with those you would call your comrades to be entirely- the point is this: you must be cautious. You work for a private institution. If they found out- well, it doesn’t bear thinking about!”

He was shouting now, and he jammed his hand in his pocket to hide the shaking. 

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “I should- I’ve no idea what came over me, I do apologise, I should-”

He shrugged helplessly. “I’ve had rather a trying day. I think I’ll head back- I am sorry. Thank you, Sean.”

He lay a quarter on the table. “Thank you for the coffee. It was lovely.”

He inclined his head slightly, and walked out the door.  
\---  
Contrary to popular opinion, Charles is no coward. 

He’s also, he thinks, too young to be this tired. He’s twenty-four, it hardly seems fair that he has already lost so much of that inexplicable idealism that so annoyed Sharon. He had once thought-- it didn’t matter, truly it didn’t, but once upon a time he had believed that he had something- different. That he could change things. That there was the possibility of something greater, that things did not have to be as they are- but he’s exhausted now, and detached, and years and bitterness and familial collapse and war and wounds and education all combine to form a toxic chasm between the boy that copied Churchill’s speeches from the wireless and memorised them and the weary man he is today. His thoughts drifted once more to Erik, and he sighed, before realising that without his notice his legs have contrived to take him back to the hospital, and so removed his hat. 

It’s nothing new. 

He walked to Erik’s room, limping heavily. Jean was on duty, and she smiled at him.  
 _Go ahead. You’ve every right._

 _It_ would _be a little difficult to explain._

 _We’ll manage.  
_  
Charles pushed open the door. 

Erik was sitting up in bed, eyes closed, the dim fluorescent light reflecting off the greasy pallor of his skin and the tufted ginger hair of his beard. 

The ventilator was gone. Charles glanced briefly at his chart. Partial fracture of the skull, complete fracture of the clavicle, tearing of the meniscus along the tensor faciae and trapesius, bruising of the kidneys, inhalation of water, fractured ribs resulting in a pulmonary oedema and resultant pleural effusion- Erik would have hit the water with a force of nearly newtons. He was lucky to be alive. 

Charles trailed off, because maybe he didn't remember him. It was entirely possible. Charles had never tried to communicate via Astral plane with someone in a coma before. Maybe it was for the best.

“Charles?” The English was impeccable, with only a slight cut of an accent on some of the more whimsical phonics.  
“I thought... I thought you weren't real. That you were a dream, or a hallucination, or-”

“I'm quite real,” Charles said with a smile. “How are you feeling today, Erik?”

Erik flinched. “Don't call me that.”

“I thought it was your name,” Charles pointed out in what he thought was sensible tone.

“I don't have a name.”

“Not even Ma-”

“ _Stop._ ” Erik spat with such vehemence that Charles did so. “Max Eisenhardt died, _Doctor_. You've been in my head, surely you can see- he's been gone for a very long time. Call me Joseph. It's what it says on my charts.”

Charles snorted. “And I suppose the history is made up as well? Er- _Joseph_ \- you need to give accurate information to the-”

“The history's all true.” Erik interrupted flatly. “There was no hiding of it anyway.” He began to rub his forearm, seemingly without realising. “You know what it means, of course?”

It wasn't a question. Charles nodded anyways.

“My daughter- Wanda, such a beautiful girl- she asked me, once. _Vati,_ , she said. _What are those numbers on your arm?_ She was only four at the time.”

 

Erik fell briefly silent.

“What did you say?” Charles prompted.

“I told her,” Erik said dreamily- the morphine was clearly having an effect on him- “I told her that it was Doktor Mengele's telephone number. That I owed him a visit.”

He glances up at Charles. “I still do.” He said simply. 

Charles nods. “What happened to her?” He asked quietly, as he eased himself into the rickety wooden chair beside the bed. 

Erik closed his eyes in remembered pain. “I don’t know. She’s with her mother, I hope. Wanda and Pietro both.”

“Unusual names,” Charles commented. 

Erik smiled slightly. “Magda picked them. I- the traditional choices had all been used.”

“Used?”

“Memories.” he said briefly. Charles wondered idly if he should feel guilty for taking advantage of a drug-addled mind, but decided on the whole that it was an acceptable moral failing. 

“I see,” Charles said neutrally. 

Erik raised an eyebrow. “Do you?”

“Not on the same scale,” Charles said, remembering sirens and shattered glass and, many years later, oppressive heat and humidity and screaming psionic pain, “But yes. I do.”

Erik nodded once, seeming vaguely unsatisfied. “Doctor,” he said at length. 

“Call me Charles,” Charles said quickly. “I’m not your doctor. That’s not why I’m here.”

Erik shook his head slowly. “Yes, I know, I see that you- but why are you here? Surely you have other things to be doing? A wife to get home to, a family?”

Charles smiled slightly. “I’m a resident, Joseph, I live here. Otherwise they would have to pay us. Nobody is waiting for me.”

Erik gave a small smirk and then winced in pain. “That doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

Charles shrugged. “I’ve fallen into a habit, what can I say?”

At Erik’s furrowed brow, he continued,choosing his words with scrupulous care, like a sparrow removing bits of seed from chaff. “I- the first night, I heard you. You woke me up, you were projecting so badly. I took an oath to do no harm. And to allow that kind of thing in a patient, when I could stop it- that would be a violation of that oath.”

Erik drew his cracked and peeling lips together in a rough grinding motion. “That’s all? Why are you still here, then? I’m awake now.”

“Well, yes, but-” Charles faltered. “You’re- I’ve come to think of you as a friend.”

Erik raised an eyebrow. “This is the first time we’ve met when I was not comatose.”

Well, yes, the man has a point, but how can Charles explain the terrible intimacy of the Astral plane? Charles knows the man in front of him as well as he knows himself, better even than Erik does, in all probability. His hopes, his dreams, his sins and fears- all laid bare before him.  
If Charles were a different sort of man, he would probably be horrified. Fortunately, Charles has absorbed just enough philosophy for it to be inconvenient, and he knows, more than anyone, that individuality is a soothing construct, privacy more so. It’s possible it should bother him, but how can it? It isn’t as if anyone consulted him in the matter. 

Charles didn’t say that. Instead, he smiled slightly. “You really should rest, you know.”

Erik scowled. “I’ve done nothing _but_ rest for weeks.”

“A coma is not the same as sleep, and you know it.” Charles smiled slightly. “I’ll come back tomorrow. If you want me to, that is.”

Erik blinked blearily. “I don’t-” He cut himself off, the colour draining from his face. 

Charles pushed himself out of his chair, bracing himself against the wall. “Erik?”

“My leg...” Erik ground out from between clenched teeth. 

Charles quickly closed the gap between him and the bed. Lifting the thin cotton blanket, he grasped the offending limb in his broad hand, running steady thumbs over tight knots of muscle. 

“It’s just a spasm,” he said finally. “From not moving for so long- tension in the body needs to express itself, to stop blood clots from forming.” He began to flex the joint, gliding his hands along the juddering flesh. 

Erik nodded tightly. Charles continued to flex the joint. Slowly, the shaking ceased, and Erik relaxed. 

“We’ll have to get you up as soon as we can,” Charles said, almost to himself. “Or you’ll lose even more muscle than you already have.”

Erik nodded, then slumped back against his pillow. 

“I’ll let you sleep, shall I?”

Erik nodded weakly. Charles considered pointing out the total turn around in his opinion on the matter in under ten minutes, but chose not to. 

_Shall I come back tomorrow?_

Charles turned and, pulling the curtain closed behind him, walked towards the door. 

Faintly, muffled with sleep and a morphine haze, came a soft psionic _yes_.  
\---  
Drinking deeply from his flask, Charles leaned back against the stoop. The torrents of rain had turned to ice, and the pavements outside were an unappetizing mixture of mud and grey-brown sludge. The air, however, was crisp, and strangely clean, and burned your lungs to breathe it in. 

He tensed as he sensed a presence behind him and resisted the urge to telepathically lash out. 

“How’s it going, Doc?” 

He relaxed as Armando slid next to him, leaning his shoulder against the rough brown brick of  
the maintenance entrance. 

Charles offered him the flask wordlessly. It gleamed sharply in the harsh light. 

“I’ve been on since 5 this morning,” he said flatly. “I thought I’d earned a break.”

Armando nodded. “And the reason you’re out here, when there’s a perfectly good surgeon’s lounge, just for you?”

Charles snorted. “It’s not for _us_. It’s for the actual surgeons. Besides, they’re so rowdy- it’s impossible to hear yourself _think_.”

A flatbed truck pulled up in front of them. Armando raised an eyebrow. “As opposed to the calm of the service entrance, yeah, sure, man, I get you.”

Charles laughed and snatched back the flask. “Give it a rest, okay? How’s your sister doing?”

Armando’s face tightened almost imperceptibly. “‘About the same, I guess. Still sick. That liniment you sent over helped.”

“Elixir of the gods, that stuff,” Charles said with a slight smile. “You really should bring her in, you know. I could probably prescribe something if I did an examination. It’s not right, a girl that age in that much pain.”

Armando shrugged. “That’s what I told Josie, but she won’t hear of it. Thinks it’s charity.”

 _Well, it is_ Charles thought uncharitably. 

“I could go to her, then,” he suggested. “I don’t mind.”

Armando looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Charles slumped against the wall and took another swig. “No,” he said softly. “No, I suppose not.”  
\---  
After his shift, Charles stops off in the rec room attached to the dorms, where overfilled ashtrays and stained sofas competed for attention with a scuffed ping-pong table and  rickety bookshelves. Having liberated a chess set and a selection of newspapers from owners who would only abuse them, he took the stairs to Erik’s ward. 

_You’re not even being subtle, now._

Charles raised an eyebrow, glancing back at the nursing station, where Jean sat seemingly absorbed in casework. 

_I can’t imagine what you think you mean_ he projected, feeling rather more snappish than the comment deserved. 

_You’re hopeless, Charles._

 

He chose to ignore that, and instead pushed through the door and pulled aside the faded beige curtains. 

Erik lay in bed, eyes shut. His beard had grown even in the day it had been since Charles had last seen him, and Charles couldn’t help but think it must be very uncomfortable. 

_Erik?_ he projected carefully, tying with it a sense of calm and trust. 

“Charles?” Erik croaked, as he blinked his eyes open. “‘s that you?”

Charles made a noise of assent, and began to turn the hand crank on the end of Erik’s bed to raise it up. 

“Your beard looks awfully itchy,” Charles said after a moment. “Didn’t one the of the nurses offer to help you shave?”

Erik glowered ineffectively. “I’m not allowed a razor. I’m on suicide watch, apparently. They think I jumped off the bridge.”

“Didn’t you?” Charles asked, honestly curious. 

Erik pursed his lips and shook his head, but said nothing. 

When no explanation was forthcoming, Charles rubbed his hands together. 

“Well,” he said, “That’s easily remedied. I’m sure they’ll have no objection if I do it for you.”

Before Erik could say anything else, Charles left in search of a razor.

He found one at the nursing station, a flimsy plastic one, and a cake of lather. 

Jean came in a moment later with a bowl of water. 

“Thanks, love,” Charles said absently. She smiled at him. 

_You know you shouldn’t be doing this._

_I’m his friend._

_You’re certainly not his doctor._

Charles did not waste too much time attempting to figure out what that was supposed to mean. 

Instead, he dampened the washcloth Jean had brought in, and began wiping Erik’s face. He twitched, but turned his head slightly to enable Charles to reach the corners of his jaw. 

He worked in silence, dampening the cake and brushing on the lather with calm deftness. His hand did not shake. 

Slowly, painstakingly slowly, he began to scrape away the hair. It was strange- shaving is a personal act, and one that is rarely performed head on. Besides, people are different- Erik was different, and Charles did not know how much pressure would be too much, would leave the skin irritated and red. 

He wondered, idly, if Erik would let him know if Charles was hurting him. He hopes so, but on the balance suspects not. 

He dipped the razor in the bowl of water, rinsing the jagged hairs from its clogged embrace.  
He dampened the wash cloth again, and wiped away excess lather. 

The process continued- dampen, lather, scrape, rinse, repeat- in complete silence, only the occasional flicker of eyelids over icy blue eyes distinguishing between the human being sitting in front of him and a statue. 

It took far longer than Charles had expected. When he had scraped away the last bit of hair, he glanced at his watch. Nearly twenty minutes had passed in silence. 

“Well,” he said awkwardly. “That’s you done, then.”

Erik smiled slightly. Without the beard, he looked strangely young. He was not much older than Charles himself, then, whatever his (clearly false) history might say. 

“Thank you,” he said hoarsely. 

Charles felt himself flush. “You’re welcome. Now,” he said hastily, keen to dispel the rapidly deepening warmth in the room, “I brought you some things. I have a chess board- do you play?”

Erik nodded his assent. “Although,” he said consideringly, “I don’t promise not to fall asleep during the game. Your company is scintillating, but-”

“I shall have to keep you on your toes, then,” Charles said, and was rewarded by a smile.  
\---

“Someone came to see me today,” Erik said conversationally, glancing up from his newspaper in which he was attempting to do the crossword. 

Charles, who had been absentmindedly filling in paperwork, jerked in surprise.  
 _Oh god he knows he knows she found him he knows I've been hiding her from him he knows_

“Oh?” Charles said, affected an air of disinterest. “Who was it, then?”

“The most remarkable woman,” Erik said dryly, his lip twisting in a grin. 

Charles felt his heart speed up. But-- _he wasn't mad he wasn't mad it wasn't her_.  
“She said she was your sister, actually. Funny, that-- you never mentioned a sister, Charles.” 

“Didn't I?” Charles said levelly. “Hmm. Must have slipped my mind.”

“Indeed,” Erik said with a smirk. “Quite a beautiful girl, your sister.”

Charles frowned over the edge of his glasses. “Yes, she is. But far too young for you, my friend.”

Erik laughed, a dry, odd thing. “You don't need to worry, Charles. I'm no good for her.” 

Charles' frown deepened. “I didn't say _that_ \--”

“--you hardly needed to,” Erik said, “It was written all across your face.”

“'On' mt face, you mean,” Charles corrected quietly.  
Erik shot him a dirty look. “Yes. She seemed quite worried about you, Charles- do you not have somewhere you need to be? You come almost every day. Your sister was quite-- forceful.”

Charles raised an eyebrow. “Was that a hint, Erik? It is quit unlike you to be so subtle- are you feeling any worse?”

Erik grinned. “I just-- I wouldn't wish to impose. Surely you--”

“--I want to be here,” Charles said quietly. “I enjoy it. Unless you wish me to leave, in which case I--”

“I-- no. No, I don't want you to leave.”

The silence that followed was oppressive, pressing it's bitter fingers into Charles' racing heart. _It's not what it sounds like that's not what he means you're never going to--_  
he cut off the thoughts with a dry laugh. 

“Well, then.” He said with a grin. “I suppose that's settled.” 

\--

 

“Erik?”

“Mm?” Erik looked up from the newspaper in front of him that he was heavily annotating with scribbled pencil markings in languages Charles did not speak. 

Charles paused, feeling the words collect behind his lips. It wasn’t his place. 

“May I ask you a question?”

Erik raised an eyebrow. “Funny, you never cared for my consent before. Why not just find out the answer to whatever it is yourself?”

Charles scowled. “You were in a coma. You would have _died_.”

 

“And that, too, would have been my right,” Erik murmured, so softly that Charles had to strain to hear.

“What are you doing here?”

Erik looked at him like he'd lost his mind. “I'm in the hospital, Charles. Some doctor you are.”

“That's not what I meant, and you know it.” Charles steepled his fingers together.

“I can't tell you that,” Erik answered after a moment. “It doesn't concern you, anyway.”

“Why not?” Charles asked softly. “I would like to think that I was your- your friend, if nothing else.”

Erik frowned. “What else would you be?”

Charles paid no mind to the way his stomach clenched at his words, to the heavy lead that suddenly seemed to line his chest. It was a completely legitimate question, anyway. What else would he be? He should be grateful to be considered a friend.

He should be grateful.

 

“I was here on business,” he said after a moment. “And I had heard- well. It's not important.”

“And what business is that?”

 

Erik's face twisted peculiarly, like he had glimpsed the vicar naked behind a curtain- part disgust, part intrigue.

 

“Why are you asking all of these questions?” He demanded suddenly.

 

Charles was taken aback. “Well, I- I just thought-”

 

“-Well, don't. I didn't ask you to be here, Charles. I didn't ask you to care, and I don't know who you think you are, but-”  
He stopped himself, deflating suddenly.

 

The silence hung in the air like a heavy mist.

 

“I didn't mean that,” Erik said after a moment. Charles felt the tendrils of his subconscious reaching out, seeking reassurance, comfort-  
 _Oh, God_.

 

“Yes,” Charles said softly. “Yes you did.”

“Charles?” Erik asked, confused.

“I- I have to go.” 

“No,” Erik said, surprisingly strongly. “No, don’t go.”

“I- you don’t want me here.”

Erik frowned. “Surely I should be the judge of that? Charles, I’m hardly a child. I know my own mind.”

 _If only that were true_ , Charles thought sorrowfully.  He said nothing.

Instead, he rose unsteadily. “Would you like to go outside?” He said abruptly.

Erik crinkles his brow in confusion. “Charles?”

“I only though- you must be awfully tired of this room.”

Erik squinted at him. “I thought I wasn’t permitted to leave? I seem to recall your being very vehement on the subject.”

“I’ll get an orderly,” Charles said slowly, the idea forming in his mind. “I’m sure it won’t be a problem.”

(This was a lie)

The hospital was surprisingly empty, and the sound of Armando’s even footsteps echoed  
through the halls.

As they reached the end of the hallway, Charles held up a hand. “I’m just going to step in here for a moment- I should check on a patient. You’re welcome to continue without me, of course.”

Erik scowled, and Armando shrugged. “Nah, Doc, we’ll wait here if it’s all the same to you.”

“As you wish,” Charles said, and pushed open the door.

Behind him, he heard a sharp intake of breath, but he did not look back. His eyes were focused on the thin brown-eyed woman in front of him.

The silence built, and  Charles felt the edges of the atmosphere fray, as though in an electrical storm.

“Magda?” He heard a hoarse whisper from behind him.

The woman stared, her face bone white. Absentmindedly, she reached up to fiddle with her brooch, stroking the worn silver.

“Max?”


	3. Chapter 3

_  
On the idle hill of summer,  
          Sleepy with the flow of streams,  
         Hark I hear the steady drummer  
          Drumming like a sound in dreams._

_Far and near and low and louder  
          On the roads of earth go by,  
         Dear to friends and food for powder,  
          Soldiers marching, soon to die._

_The Shropshire Lad , by AE Housman _

It was something of a farce, Charles mused detachedly, even as he heard himself say:  
“Erik?”  
and Armando's soft “You all right there, Joseph?”

There was no reply.

 

“Joseph?”

 

“Yes, I- yes. Yes, I'm fine.” Erik stared ahead uncomprehendingly. “Magda? _mój Boże,_ Magda, _Jest to, że_?”

 

“ _Max?_ ”

Charles took a step back, pressing his spine tightly against the cool metal of the doorframe. Magda stepped forward slowly, as though making her way through a thick mist.

 

She bent down, meeting his cool grey eyes with her sharp brown ones. “ _To naprawdę ty_ ”, she said wonderingly. It's really you.

 

Fine tremors ran through her weathered hands, and they jumped like spiders as she reached out to cup his face.

She raised a finger, as though to stroke him- and slapped him, hard.

“ _Tchòrz_ ”, she spat. Glancing up, she met Charles' eyes, as though seeing him for the first time.  
“Bobby is not so well today, Doctor,” she said quietly. “You will have to check him over, yes?”

 

Charles nodded. “I was just about to do so, ma'am.”

 

She sniffed pointedly. “You will do it _now_.”

 

“Yes, ma'am.” Charles gripped his cane unsteadily. “Joseph, you'll be alright?”

He met his eye, and for a moment, Charles felt a half-dozen ill-timed words collect behind his lips.  
He swallowed audibly.

 

“Go, Charles.” Erik said quietly, in a voice like sandpaper.

 

Charles went.

 

Charles will never remember the rest of that day. Something occurred, surely, but try though he might, his only feelings, when he later recalls that encounter, testing its corners with his words as one might do a sore tooth with a tongue, are of a queer, detached loss. Which didn't make any _sense_ , and so apparently had been dispensed with by his brain as not only irrational but irrelevant besides.

 

Somehow, he finished his shift. Nobody asked. Nobody died. And when, later that night, he felt the familiar batterings of jagged memories against the smooth and pockmarked shields of his mind, he gave no reply, and instead opened the bottom door of his rickety nightstand to reveal a small silver flask of whiskey, which he downed with equanimity.

When he dreamed that night, it was of children not his own, and of a life that was not this life. He woke up anyway.

It took several days for Charles to force himself to see Erik. In that time, he found himself growing more and more sure. So what if he had manipulated the man? So what if the psychic plane had left them both—uneasy--? He was a doctor. He had a duty.

(And a friend, perhaps. Nothing more.)

Armed with a chessboard and a packet of cigarettes- something for which he knew Erik longed- he pushed open the door, only to be greeted with the sight of the other man sitting on the edge of his bed, struggling with a clean black turtleneck.

The muscles of his back were visible in the dim fluorescent light, as were the sharp juts of bone marking his ribcage. Here and there, yellowed and greying bruises remained, bordering surgical tape and butterfly stitches in a macabre tableau.

 

“Erik?” Charles couldn't help but allow some of the disapproval he was feeling seep over into his voice. “What on earth are you doing?”

 

“Leaving,” Erik said shortly. With a grunt, he forced the sweater over his torso, erasing the image of his wounds from sight. Slowly, laboriously, he pushed himself up from the bed to stand unsteadily beside it, one arm braced against the wall.

 

Without thinking, Charles instinctively moved forward to offer himself as a means of support.  
“What?”

 

“I'm checking out,” Erik said quietly. “There's nothing for me here anymore.”

 

Charles gaped at him. “I beg your pardon? Are you insane? Is this about-”

 

“--it has nothing to do with her,” Erik said bluntly. “It's time. I have a job to do. We can't all spend our days lounging in bed like there's nothing wrong in the world.”

His fingers clutched Charles' shoulder almost unconsciously, the over-long nails biting through the cheap, starched cotton of his coat. Charles shivered, but did not move away.

 

“Erik, you can't do this. Your injuries haven't healed yet.”

“Don't tell me what to do.”

Charles gaped at him. He felt the words building behind his lips, and steeled himself. This was going to be bad.

He said it anyway.

“Isn't it enough that your wife and children abandoned you? You've lost everything, Erik, and for what? What have you gained? You're alone, Erik. You-”

 

“Don't you _ever_ speak about my family like that again.” Erik scowled, and the harsh lighting only served to sharpen his features even more, the chiseled angles standing out angrily against his artificial pallor.

 

“Things are happening, Charles, things that you can't understand- or maybe you don't want to, I don't know. There are things bigger than us, I know you know that.”

 

Charles shook his head silently. Maybe he had believed that, once. It was hard to remember.

 

“And I have to-- I have a duty. I can't-- there are things I have to do. Things that only I can do. I need to go.”

 

“ _Tell everyone who'll listen_ ”, Charles murmured absently. “ _Tell everyone who won't._ ”

 

Erik looked at him, startled. When he spoke, it was with a kind of detached affection, as though greeting someone whom he had not seen for a long time and who he did not expect to encounter again.

 

“Something like that,” he smiled briefly. A brief look of consternation passed over his face, and he reached a hand up, wincing slightly. When it settled, it did so on the edge of Charles' jaw, rough with stubble and lack of sleep.

 

It was shockingly intimate.

 

“There's something about you,” Erik mused. “I can't-- I don't even know if it's real. I suspect you don't, yourself. But there's something, and I-- it's a distraction. In my line of work, I can't afford distractions.”

 

Charles reached up and slowly removed the other man's hand from his face, passing his thumb over the third and fourth knuckles as he did so. The hand was rough, and warm, and Charles realised with a kind of detached shock that this was the closest he had been to another human being since that night with Jean all those weeks ago.

 

“Perhaps I'll look you up,” Charles said teasingly. “Surely you have a telephone.”

 

“Don't bother,” Erik said abruptly, but he was smiling. “Have you forgotten, Charles? _I don't exist._ ”  


 

Something flickered across his face, and then, wincing, he moved forward, pressing his body against Charles. He reached again, pulling Charles' face towards his.

“Joseph doesn't exist,” Charles said quietly. “What about Erik?”

 

“Erik was never here,” Erik whispered, and pressed his lips against the other man's. His breath was stale, and his lips chapped, and Charles couldn't breathe, and it was all irrelevant, because Erik was leaving, Erik had never been here, Erik was a ghost who was a man who was a ghost.

 

“Goodbye, Doctor Xavier,” Erik murmured when he broke away. “I doubt I'll see you again.”

 

Charles smiled sadly. “Goodbye, Joseph.”

 

\-----  
 _”Doctor Xavier, please go to Operating Theatre Three immediately. I repeat, Doctor Xavier to Operating Theatre Three.”_

Charles looked at the clock, the numbers blurry in the fading daylight. Stubbing out his cigarette, he drained the cup of instant coffee that sat in front of him.

Glancing at the other men, Charles sighed and threw down his cards. “I believe I'm being called, gentlemen. We shall have to finish our game another time.”

 

Sean grinned. “Hey, at least it's your last day. After this, they won't be able to order you around anymore.”

 

Charles smirked. “I live in hope.” He said drily. “Straight flush, by the way.”  
Laughing at their exclamations, he walked out of the room.

 

He hadn't reached the theatre yet when Logan stopped him. Pressing a chart into his hands. “Go talk to next-of-kin,” he ordered gruffly. “And then scrub up, this looks like it'll be a long one. Nine year old male, blunt force trauma as a result of falling off a balcony railing, compound fractures and probable organ damage. Better hurry.”

 

He rushed off in the other direction, muttering to himself. Charles stared at him, slightly amused. Maybe it was Stockholm Syndrome, but he had grown fond of the man over the past year.

 

He rushed into the waiting room outside trauma. “Next-of-kin for--” He glanced at the chart. “Pietro Maximoff?”

 

He blinked at the apparent coincidence, until he heard. “Right here, Doctor Xavier.”

 

He raised an eyebrow as Magda pushed herself to her feet, jiggling a small bundle of blankets in the against her right shoulder.

 

“Oh.” Charles said distractedly. “Right, then, Mrs, er, Maximoff, if you could join me in the hall please?”

 

Outside, Charles bustled professionally. “Erm, I'll need you to sign these, please, we're going to be attempting to repair the damage to the shoulder and ribs, as well as some tears to the meniscus, if you haven't already been--”

“--I was,” Magda said dryly. “Damned efficient, these nurses of yours.”

Charles smiled slightly. “Right, well, yes, then--”

 

“Doctor Xavier,” Magda interrupted, mercifully putting an end to his nervous sputtering. “Have you heard from him?”

 

They both knew to whom she referred. Charles shook his head wordlessly.

She nodded once, seemingly satisfied. “Go do your job, Doctor.” she said, with the barest trace of a smile. “I will still be here when you are finished.”

 

He paused as he turned to leave. “The baby?”

 

Magda smiled broadly. “Her name is Chaya”

“A beautiful name,” Charles murmured. “What does it mean?”

She smiled again, a soft, secret smile. “It means 'life'.” 

\--  
“Reverend Father, Ladies and Gentlemen, honoured guests, it gives me great pleasure to present to you the graduating class of 1955!”

Charles pushed himself to his feet as the rest of the crowd did so, applauding fervently as Raven waved at him from the crowd of graduates, her cap slightly askew on her bright hair glinting in the June sunlight. 

In the ensuing chaos, Charles does not notice someone sneaking up behind him until it is too late. 

“She looks very happy,” a voice whispers in his ear. “You've done well by her, Charles.” 

Charles jumped, twisting his neck as he turned to look in the direction of the sound. He gasped. “Erik?”

A grin stretches its way across tanned and chiseled features. If Charles did not know better, he would never dream of ascribing this man the identity of that shadowed creature who had spent so many months in a hospital bed. 

“Erik, what are you doing here?”

The smile fades, then, twisting in on itself. “I came to say goodbye.” 

Charles could not help but laugh, a cold, pale thing. “Tradition dictates that one does that _before_ one vanishes into the night, I should think.”

Erik just looked at him. “I'm sorry. I had work to do.”

Charles snorted. “Oh _yes_ , work. What is it you do, then?”

 

Erik rubbed the back of his neck, the hairs on his forearms glinting in the hot sun. 

“I can't tell you that.” 

“Or what, you'll have to kill me?” Charles teased. 

“Something like that.”

Despite himself, Charles felt a shiver of arousal spark down his spine. “Erik, I-”

“Charles?” Raven says, pushing through the crowds of people to find his side, “Who are you talking to?”

“What do you-” Charles glanced to his left, where the other man had been standing. It was empty.

“Never mind,” he said softly, reaching into his pocket to pull out his lighter. “Congratulations, my dear, you can't imagine how--”  
he stopped, as his hands closed around a bit of paper that most assuredly had not been there five minutes ago.  
It had writing on it, thought like none Erik had ever seen.  
He squinted slightly, willing the inky lines to reform themselves into something legible. 

_Na razie, Charles_ it said. _Bądź bezpieczny_

 _And you, my friend_ Charles projected, searching the surroundings for the soft metallic pulse of the other man's mind. 

He did not find it, and so must have imagined the answering pulse of laughter and affection, carried on the wind. 

 

_Oxford, England. April 3rd, 1962_

 

“Charles?” Raven calls as she pushed the door open. “Charles, are you here?”

“In the kitchen!” Came the muffled call. “There's bacon sandwiches, if you're interested.”

“Thank Christ,” she groaned, kicking off her shoes. “I've been on my feet since 7, there was a terrible car accident on--”

She stopped in surprise. “Doctor McTaggart. What- sorry, but what are you doing here?”  
Doctor McTaggart arched an eyebrow in amusement. “Raven. Or- it's Doctor Darkholme, now, isn't it? Congratulations.”

 

“Thanks.” Raven said, not bothering to hide her confusion.

Charles glanced at them. “Shall I tell her, then?”

Moira smiled. “No need, Charles, I can do it. Raven, dear, you may wish to sit down.”

Raven did so.

“I've been working rather closely with the American government in the years since I last saw you,” she began, “And a... situation... has recently arisen for which I hoped your brother could be of some assistance. It was he who suggested that you may be useful as well.”

 

Raven glanced at Charles, who nodded encouragingly. “Go on,” she said, aiming and failing to sound authoritative.

 

“What do you know,” Moira began, “ About _mutants_?”


End file.
